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Literally blood, sweat and tears, but yaay it's done!! For this corset I really pushed myself into the unknown and never tried territory. I took the theme as opportunity and motivation to try my hand at a corset body style with hip fins. I really wanted to have elements of ballet in this corset but also not to travel too far from corsetry itself, and I think I accomplished that with a nice mash-up of corset, ballet, and even some flavors of burlesque or theater thrown in. The corset body is reminiscent of a ballet dancer's leotard and I incorporated a slight scoop to the back above the grommets; also a nod to the leotard. The hip fins are corsetry's version of a tutu and I added a black ruffle in the seam between the hip fins and the corset body to give it that extra tutu flare. The tassels are an element of theater in general and to me give this piece a bit of a burlesque or even a carnival gypsy feel, hence the name I chose.

This corset was not without its challenges, for sure. I constructed the top half and the hip pieces separately, and putting the hip fins and ruffle in that seam meant I had to make my poor machine sew through an incredible number of layers. After it was constructed I kept having to try to shove the hip fins through my machine as I finished sewing bone channels to the hips, putting on the binding, etc. This meant not every seam wound up perfectly straight, and I broke down in tears in a corset group on Facebook. I'm so thankful for the very supportive community we have and everyone’s kind words and understanding that pushed me through it. I know we are all incredibly critical and hard on ourselves - unnecessarily so. This is only my twelfth corset, and I'm going to try to let myself be proud of it and then sleep for a month!